


Grantaire's Soliloquy

by A_New_World_To_Be_Won



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Canon Era, M/M, Soliloquy, my boy is drunk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-14 10:07:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16490534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_New_World_To_Be_Won/pseuds/A_New_World_To_Be_Won
Summary: Late one night, Grantaire ponders what is to come.





	Grantaire's Soliloquy

**Author's Note:**

> So this is the first time I have written from a first-person POV so I hope you all like it!!!  
> Thank you so much to @cantando_siempre who was the beta for this fic and helped me in SO many ways <3  
> Enjoy!!

_ Why?  _

 

Why do I continue to worship you like the god you were meant to be, when you only sneer and turn away? 

 

I watch you in meetings, day after day after day, and you never cease to amaze me, with your rants and your fire and your determination. I argue, and you fight back with everything you have and nothing in the world is more beautiful, for how can anything bear to put the sun to shame? Because you are the sun, you are Apollo, you must be. For who other than Apollo would have eyes like fire and ice all at once, hair the color of spun gold, lips the palest shade of pink? 

 

And I - I am Dionysus, drinking away what little remains of my hopes and dreams. No - I am being too bold, comparing myself to a god when the only god here is you. And how can a god such as you ever deign to even glance in my direction? I understand this, accept it even.

 

But now you see why I must oppose everything you stand for, because if I do not, then how will our eyes ever lock, how will your words ever be aimed at me?

 

And you hate me, it’s true, and with good reason, because I am not like the others. I am not filled with passion and hope, only cynicism and despair and a pit where my heart used to be, a pit I try to fill with whiskey and ale and you.

 

No. No, that is not quite right, because if I had no heart I could not feel the way you make me feel. If I had no heart, I would not be as terrified as I am right now, because I know, I  _ know  _ that all of us will die in a matter of days, but -

 

_ I don’t have to.  _

 

You do not want me there, this I know. You do not think I am capable of being anything more than a minor annoyance to your revolution, the water that douses the fire, the breeze that blows out the candle. But - you will see. You will see. 

 

Do you remember what happened that night, I wonder? You had been drinking - I do not know how they had managed to get you to have one, with your disgust at the very mention of alcohol - but they had done it somehow and we were outside, long after everyone had left, and you were yelling and yelling and I was watching - as that is all I can do with you, just watch and argue - but then somehow your lips were on mine and they were hot and cold and chapped and smooth and everything in the world all at once and I wanted to revel in it, I  _ did  _ revel in it, but only for a moment because you were drunk, so I pushed you away.

 

I pushed you away. 

 

It did not matter - you did not remember it the next day anyway, or the day after that, at least that I know of. Only - when our eyes met, when we were arguing the day after - your eyes grew soft, and filled with something that I cannot begin to describe. It was but a second, and yet it was forever. What were you thinking? This I wonder, and will wonder until the day I die. 

 

And Apollo, you must forgive me, for I now suspect I shall live to outlast the sun. 

 

Because I do not have to do this. Long live the republic, but I am not one of you and can never be. I have never believed in the cause - you told me to be serious, but I am and have always been wild _. _

 

But you are an angel, a god, a martyr, and so you must die, because it has been written in the stars for longer than you have been alive. You were born to die a hero, and I - I was born to mourn. 

 

But I cannot - will not - mourn, because life without you is meaningless and the world was gray before I knew you, and will be gray once you are gone. I cannot stand to live in a world that is gray now that I have known what vibrant colors there are - pale skin like snow, and golden strands of hair that shine in the wavering candlelight, and  _ red,  _ so much red, like wine and roses and blood -

 

There will be so much blood. 

 

So. I will join you tomorrow, or the next day, or whenever you stand to fight. I can pretend I am here for the cause, but I am here only for you. 

 

What was it that I heard murmured after a particularly bad argument, murmured by the poet with stars in their eyes?  _ Nobody loves the light like the blind man.  _ I think they knew, knew all too well my feelings, and they were right. I can never have you, so I must idolize you, sketch and trace and shade your picture a thousand times in my head but never get the courage to pick up the pencil. 

 

If I ever did become brave enough, I do not know how I would paint you. Where could I start to immortalize such radiance? I would do my best- which could never be good enough, how would it ever be good enough- to render your features, but where would you look? Would you face the streets of Paris, courage carved into that marble brow, or would you watch your friends, love etched in the twist of your mouth? There are countless ways I can draw you, each more beautiful than the last- all except one. I could never draw you facing forward, because then you would be looking at me, and that cannot be.  I know how you feel, or at least, I think I do, and someone such as me would never be looked at with the apparent love and care you grant your comrades. While I could never hope to gain your compassion, I comfort myself with what little of you I can receive: your anger, your determination, your words, your mind. 

 

I hate that I have to argue with you to get you to notice me, hate how that is the only time I can truly look at you.

 

But will our arguments matter in three days time? Will everyone who witnessed them be cold, our words forgotten? It’s strange how that happens - something so true, so vivid, forgotten in a moment, left to the merciless void of unknown history. 

 

Maybe it’s better that way. 

 

Maybe we are all better off as hints of memories, so that people can look back one day and remember a snippet of laughter, a word here and there, a group that barely missed becoming historic, and think to themselves - I wonder where they are now? Are they married, with children, old and gray? 

 

In this way, we can remain immortal. 

 

What am I saying? This is just another drunken ramble. Look at the bottles that surround me; look and think of the minotaur trapped inside the Labyrinth. I am that minotaur, in more ways than one. Why do I do this, drink myself into oblivion every night and pile bottles and sorrows higher and higher, sealing myself into the center of the maze? It takes more and more of my money each time, and at this rate it is good that I may be dead in three days time, otherwise where would I go?

 

I jest. But I do not need to do so when there is only me to listen. Can I be honest with myself? Am I willing to die?

 

I -

 

Willing... isn’t the right word.  _ Ready.  _ I am ready, though not willing. Ready to die if it means you can live another day, for you can do everything I cannot. You inspire and create and bring about change, and I can only mock and laugh and drink. 

 

Ready to die for you, because of you, with you. To die by your side would be the most heavenly way to die, and maybe then you would realize that I do not detest you, do not mock you out of spite; I only antagonize you because I know that then, and only then, I can have your gaze locked on me, and I am breathless with the vividity of it and when it leaves me it feels like coming up for air but wishing I could sink back under forever.

 

Before I die, I suppose I should like for you to look at me, and only me, one last time.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you guys for reading!!! Please leave comments and kudos!! <3


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